


Becoming Anne

by LEDbiantastic



Category: Angel: the Series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-05
Updated: 2016-09-05
Packaged: 2018-08-13 06:56:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7966855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LEDbiantastic/pseuds/LEDbiantastic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I just recently re-watched the first episode in Angel where we see Anne Steele (who had shown up twice in Buffy as Chantarelle and then as Lily). I was thinking about the impressive amount of growth her character shows, going from a struggling runaway to running a shelter for homeless youth. We don't get to see her journey, just who she becomes as a result. So I wrote a short piece that starts the moment Buffy leaves her with the job, apartment, and new name and goes until she meets Angel. It's not my usual style, so I hope people like it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Becoming Anne

**Author's Note:**

> This story begins immediately where the Buffy episode Season 3 Episode 1: Anne leaves off, and goes up to the beginning of Angel Season 2 Episode 12: Blood Money. Please enjoy!

Becoming Anne

She has her first shift at the diner that same day. Things start awkward; she doesn't answer when they call. She has to train herself to respond to the name on her nametag—Anne. She's Anne now. Anne is strong, solitary. Anne doesn't need a man or anyone else to take care of her. Anne can take care of herself. Anne is running from something in her past and avoiding what’s familiar, but that fits in with her new persona anyway.

  
It doesn't take too long before Anne sees a familiar face as she's closing the diner early one morning. It's one of the kids she led out of that Hell dimension. She gives him some food. Next time, she gives both of them food. The third time she gets caught and her pay gets docked, but she doesn't care.

She asks the kids where they're sleeping, and when they exchange uncertain glances, she reminds them that she was in that Hell dimension just like they were, and for the same reasons. She tells them that the only reason she has this job is because of Buffy. They give each other knowing looks. They won't be forgetting that name any time soon.

  
The kids take her to their squat, and she checks it out. She's unfazed that the building is condemned; she hardly notices the piles of feces and vomit. She used to sleep somewhere just like this. She's not checking for hygiene, she's checking for pimps. None of the men she sees in the squat are any pimps she recognizes, but that doesn't mean much. There are a lot of pimps.

  
This wasn't part of the plan. Anne wasn't going to get involved. She was going to take care of herself, stay out of trouble, build a life for herself. But she finds herself taking long walks that bring her past the kids' squat, checking up on them. Then she starts ambling past the squats she used to use with Rickie.

Sometimes she sees kids and teens who are hurt, who have probably been beaten up by their pimp, their John, their drug seller, or maybe it was just a normal fight. She always talks to them and offers to clean them up. If they let her, she brings them back to Buffy's apartment—Anne can’t think of it as hers, if she did she'd think she didn't deserve it—and does her best to treat whatever they have. Anne doesn't know anything about first aid other than that you should wash out cuts, so that's what she does. She ices bruises, washes out cuts, and tries to stop bleeding, all the while listening to anything they tell her or telling them her story if they don't want to talk. If they don't let her clean them up, she just talks to them for a while. She tells them about herself, how she used to live on the street with Rickie. If they already know about vampires and stuff, she tells them that she got dragged into a Hell dimension. If not she just makes it out to be a slavery ring. No matter whether the conversation is happening at Buffy’s apartment or sitting on a curb, she always gives them this simple piece of advice when their time together ends: “Listen, if you're ever desperate, come by the diner where I work and I'll get you something to eat that you don't have to pay for with your body.”

“I'm trying to run a restaurant, Anne, not a charity!” Her boss says when the kids show up, but since she pays for everything there is nothing he can do.

Word starts to spread among the homeless teens. “If you’re in trouble, you can talk to Anne. She knows what it’s like; she’s been there. She won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do.”

They start showing up at the diner in dozens, and Anne’s boss gives her dirty looks and mutters, “This is a restaurant, not a charity.”

The phrase eventually gives Anne an idea, and she starts looking for homeless shelters. She finds the East Hills Teen Center and starts volunteering there. She brings with her a veritable army of homeless teens who start showing up as soon as they hear Anne’s there. The staff at the teen center redouble their efforts to accommodate all the new clients, and Anne spends all of her time that she’s not working at the diner at the teen center, except a few hours late at night or early in the morning when she sleeps. She’s there so much that the director works some budgeting magic and finds a small amount of money to create a salaried position for Anne. She becomes the teen center’s first Outreach Coordinator. Anne tells the kids to spread the word that she’s quit her job at the diner and now she works at the East Hills Teen Center.

The salary is pretty small, but the other staff members look the other way when Anne eats the meals prepared at the shelter for the teens—that is, when the other staff members aren’t sitting down with her to eat the shelter food.

Anne works hard at the shelter, she stays late almost every night. One day after she’s been there for about a year, she gets called in to meet with the director. The director tells Anne that she wants to leave, and she wants to recommend Anne take over as director.

Anne is completely shocked. “But I never even graduated from high school!” She protests. “I don’t know… anything!”

“You know what those kids need and you’re dedicated to helping them. That’s the most important thing. You’ve seen enough of how this place is run to pick up the rest as you go along. If you’re feeling really dedicated, take a couple of night-school business classes. We might even be able to find the money to help pay for them. If you’re not ready, I could recommend a more senior member of staff who’ll burn out after a year or two, but I’d rather recommend someone who can last longer than that to give this place more stability. I think you’ve got what it takes.”

Anne can only nod, dumbly. But on her next free morning she goes to the library to look up resources on taking a few business classes.

Anne directs the East Hills Teen Center for a year. She dedicates her life to the teen center. She eats, sleeps, and works at the center. She feels, for the first time, like her life has meaning. She doesn’t date—it’s kind of hard for her to think about letting someone in after Rickie. Plus, she’s finally strong enough and independent enough that she doesn’t need to rely on anybody but herself, and she doesn’t want to lose that. When she has time to think about it, it occurs to Anne that she’s such a different person now, she’s not sure she and Rickie would even work as a couple if she met him today. The thought sometimes makes her sad, and sometimes it makes her glad, which makes her feel bad for feeling glad. When she starts to have these thoughts, she throws herself into the work at the center, staying late and going through the books over and over again.

She has a bit of a scare when a couple of her kids get into trouble with the police. She knows they’re good kids who don’t have a lot of options, but she has no way to pay for the kind of lawyers that could actually help them. Luckily, a law firm called Wolfram and Hart steps up and offers to represent the kids pro bono. Anne breathes a sigh of relief when she gets the news. As long as her kids are okay…

As long as there are people out there like Buffy, like the lawyers at Wolfram and Hart, who will step up and help out someone like Anne, who will defend the people who can’t defend themselves… As long as Anne knows those people are out there, she can keep doing the work she does. She can keep striving to do more, to help more, to be like Buffy—to become Anne.

And that’s what Anne’s life has become, until one night she bumps into a tall, dark stranger…


End file.
